Anytime you’re quoting Gary Sheffield you’re probably starting off on the wrong foot. Yes, Sheff’s the same guy who says he didn’t take steroids like the cream and the clear because “steroids is something you stick in your butt.” Clearly Sheff’s logic is second-to-none. Anyway, with MLB celebrating the 62nd anniversary of Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier in baseball, Dodgers’ second baseman Orlando Hudson talked about blacks in baseball:
“There aren’t too many blacks in baseball, period,” Hudson said. “They feel like they won’t get that chance. You watch the College World Series, how many African Americans do you see?”
…
“You look at it, you know, Brandon Phillips plays every day. Jimmy Rollins, Ryan Howard play every day. [I] play every day. Vernon Wells plays every day. [Carl] Crawford plays every day. [Mike] Cameron plays every day. Bill Hall plays every day. I don’t know too many African American bench players.”
First of all, I don’t care for that line of thinking to begin with. We hear some player saying it almost every year, invariably around this time. MLB doesn’t discriminate; whether you’re Indian, Korean, Colombian, Mexican, Japanese, Italian, or African American, they’re just looking for someone who can hit, field, or pitch exceptionally well. It’s up to each individual to choose what sport they want to play. African Americans are great athletes and dominate pro football and basketball. They’re free to play baseball too — there aren’t any race restrictions.
Furthermore, Hudson’s line about bench players is simply ignorant; just because Orlando can’t think of any black bench players off the top of his head doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Without doing much thinking I came up with Craig Monroe, Dewayne Wise, Joe Thurston, Fred Lewis, Dexter Fowler, Damion Easley, and Daryle Ward as guys who are or have been bench players recently. I wonder what Hudson has to say about that. I wish they would just drop the issue entirely. I would guess that the amount of white American players has decreased lately because of the global growth of the game but I don’t hear anyone complaining about that.
